


carve me a piece of your world

by crownedSerpent09



Category: How to Get Away with Murder
Genre: Alternate Universe - Ghost Town, Banter, First Meetings, Fluff and Angst, M/M, Road Trips, asher does a ghost-repelling ritual at one point
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-19
Updated: 2016-07-19
Packaged: 2018-07-25 08:35:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7525843
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crownedSerpent09/pseuds/crownedSerpent09
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A group of law students go on a road trip, and Connor might have fallen in love with a ghost.</p>
            </blockquote>





	carve me a piece of your world

It was mid-morning when Connor woke up in the car, sun beating down on him through the tinted window. His mouth felt like it was stuffed with cotton, and his eyelids still stuck to his lower lashes. Everything felt too stuffy and oppressive; his legs were cramped from being folded in the small space in the backseat of Laurel’s car for hours. He tried to extend them, grumbling under his breath, and ended up with one foot kicking Michaela’s legs and the other kicking the back of Asher’s seat, earning him death glares from the former and waking the latter.

In typical Asher fashion, he had upped the volume in the car three times over within five seconds. He sang loudly to the obnoxiously repetitive lyrics of a bland pop song, whooping, pumping his fists, and trying to get his friends to join in between autotuned lines. When he was ignored on Wes’ muttered sentiment of “Maybe if we don’t look at it it’ll go away,” he even tried opening the sunroof, seemingly unperturbed by the swirling red dust that pervaded the air around their car.

“Come on guys, we’re on a road trip!” he hooted, prying open the cover. Without warning, Laurel jabbed the button that opened the glass partition and Asher was met with a face full of sand. “My eyes!” he exclaimed and promptly dissolved into a fit of coughing as the dust settled into his throat.

His companions burst out in laughter. “Sorry,” Laurel said insincerely. Asher slumped in his seat, but he perked up by the introduction of the next song by the radio DJ.

Around 12, they began to suggest stopping for lunch. The towns on this road were few and far in between, but the search on Laurel’s GPS found one within ten minutes of their location. The law students all became alive at the prospect of food, and their previous tired conversation turned into the party Asher had tried to instigate earlier.

The wind died down once Laurel turned off the highway, and they eagerly rolled down the windows to take in the fresh air as they drove on the single road that led to the small town, already in sights. Their laughter poured out of the windows, the silence from the radio going unnoticed as their banter filled in the gaps.

The town was also noiseless as they pulled in past the weather-worn sign proclaiming “Welcome to Osstopa, Population: “ A dark gray smudge covered the number on the sign. As they ventured farther along Main Street, the quietness of the atmosphere seemed to press in, and they were chilled despite the warm weather.

“Why aren’t there any people on the streets?” Asher was the first to ask.

“Maybe this town is deeply religious and they’re all taking their Sabbath,” Michaela guessed.

“It’s a Tuesday,” said Laurel.

They drove at a crawl between boarded up storefronts and tumbleweed. The old newspapers and sparse litter on the ground looked at least fifty years old.

Connor whipped out his phone. “Guys, I think we may be in a real ghost town.” He grinned giddily, hurriedly typing the name of the town into Google Search. He frowned as he scrolled through the results, then pressed the button to go to the second page. “There’s nothing on this town that we’re in, though.”

“That means we’re the ones that found it!” Michaela began taking pictures of the scenery as Laurel maneuvered them through the streets. “I wonder what organization we have to contact to get credit for this. I can already imagine this going in my portfolio!”

“Okay, is no one going to acknowledge that this is a little creepy?” Asher demanded, rolling up his window. “I’m not saying there are actual ghosts here, but if there are, no one’s around to find our bodies.”

The mood in the car was immediately dampened by Asher’s declaration. Connor tried to draw a sarcastic quip from within himself, but he was distracted by the figure sitting on the steps of a sizable building.

“Hey!” Connor called out. His heart was thrumming in his chest, and he needed to prove Asher’s statement wrong. The figure looked up from where he was staring at his lap, engrossed in the details of his hands. The eyes behind wire-rimmed spectacles blinked owlishly at Connor, and his pale face wrinkled in concentration. Everything about him was pale, Connor noticed, from his skin tone to his clothes to the dusty blackness of his hair. He opened his mouth to answer, but Connor’s attention was diverted to a comment made by one of his friends.

“What are you yelling about?” Michaela asked, trying to follow his line of sight over his shoulder.

“The guy sitting over there.” Connor pointed. When he turned back, Michaela and Wes were looking at him oddly.

“I don’t see anyone,” Wes said slowly.

“Guys, come on. You’re not funny.”

“No, really,” Michaela added. “There’s no one there.”

Asher whipped around in his seat. “Are you guys saying that Connor saw a ghost?”

Laurel was still steadily driving them through the streets, away from the library. Connor glanced out the rear window. The guy was still there, staring after him.

“There’s no ghost,” Connor said, wanting to crawl out of his skin. “Let’s just go. There’s no food here.”

The others gave general consent. Just as Laurel turned onto Main Street, the car emitted a loud warning sound and stuttered to a stop.

“Oh, come on!” Asher banged his fists on the dashboard. “You couldn’t have waited until we were out of this creepy town to break down? What kind of cheesy horror movie plotline is this?”

“We’re just out of gas,” Laurel said, deceptively calm. They could all hear the underlying quiver in her voice. “I’ll just go fill it up with the tank in the back.” And despite Asher’s yelps for her to do the opposite, she exited the car and walked around it to open the trunk.

The inside of the car was quiet when Laurel returned a minute later. She stuck her head through the driver’s door. “Where’s the spare gas?”

Asher cleared his throat. “I might have removed it to make room for the box of chips.” He was met by collective groans from his classmates.

“I’m going to call a tow truck,” Laurel said, refusing to lose her cool. “At least there’s still cell service.” She settled into her seat and closed the door with a thump.

Apparently, tow truck services did not apply in the middle of nowhere. Laurel went through five companies before she found one that agreed to pick them up, and it was after continued screaming into the receiver by a frazzled Michaela that the company decided to aid them. However, it would take at least a day before the nearest truck became available and could drive out to them.

“Great,” Michaela bit out once Laurel hung up.

The car was silent for all of a minute before the noise of a car door opening broke through the pause.

“Wes, what are you doing?” Michaela demanded.

“I’m going to look around. There’s no way I’m spending an entire day in the car, ghost town or no.”

“Point,” Connor declared and pushed out his own door.

“We should stick together,” Asher said as the rest spilled out of the sedan.

“This town is small enough that we can find each other just by yelling, probably,” Laurel said. Despite the confidence in her words, she looked unsure. Wes and Connor were already half a street away, splitting in opposite directions.

Connor’s heart was in his throat as he speed-walked back the way they came. He had to find the old library again. He had to make sure what he saw was real.

The yellow-orange dust blew in his face as he hurried down the middle of the street. On either side, cracked stones and crumbling mortar held up buildings festooned in dried wood boards, boasting faded establishment names and covering up windows that were both gaping black holes and murky glass. Everything felt odd and empty; no birds flew overhead and no rats scurried along the litter. Besides the tumbleweed and some weeds poking out of the dry ground, there was no plant life. Even though Connor knew his friends were stomping around just around the corner, he felt utterly alone in this world, trapped in a dreamlike state in which there was just him and the empty street, devoid of all noise except the wind blowing in his ears.

The library seemed to be the largest building in town, larger than even the town hall on Main Street. The steps in front of it were plain stone smoothed out by years and years of exposure to the swirling sands. Connor stopped right alongside it. There was no one.

Connor’s curiosity was unsatiated and he continued on so that he was on the steps, in the same spot as the man he had seen had been sitting.

“It’s you again.”

Connor nearly stumbled off the steps in his surprise. The man from before had emerged from the barely open door of the old library. He stood right in front of Connor now. Connor noted that he was only a few inches taller than Connor on the top of the steps, and if they stood on even ground he would be at eye level.

“Who are you?” The question fell thick and heavy from his tongue. The question surprised him; he had not meant to ask it nor in that manner. Or had he? Connor wasn’t sure anymore.

The man blinked several times behind his wire-rimmed glasses before answering. “My name is Oliver. I lived in Osstopa.”

“Lived?” Connor shoved away Asher’s voice in his head with his mentions of ghosts. “You seem a bit too young to have lived in here before it became --- “ He waved his hand vaguely at their surroundings.

Oliver smiled like he knew exactly what Connor meant. He had a nice smile, Connor noticed. The way the corners of his mouth pushed up in the small curve was sweet. Connor was fascinated.

“This all happened quicker than you could imagine. I was a small boy when I lived in this town. When I came back, it was all gone.” His face was wistful as he looked out at the dilapidated buildings all around. Connor wanted chase that look away.

“I have a day before the tow truck comes to get me and my friends,” Connor said without thinking. “I guess you must know the town pretty well. Would you show me around?”

Oliver smiled again as Connor relayed his request. Connor stamped down the burst of victory in his chest quickly. “Of course I will.”

Connor was lost in the glimmer in Oliver’s eyes, and he had to shake himself out of a reverie before he remembered to introduce himself. “I’m Connor, by the way. And oh --- my friends would probably like to meet you. They’re over th --- “

“Getting reacquainted with my old home,” Oliver interrupted, “has been --- it’s an incomprehensible feeling. Maybe I should meet them later, when I’m more up for it.”

“Okay,” Connor agreed, secretly relishing the opportunity to keep this man for himself for now. “Let’s go.”

Oliver told him about the library as they made their way back down to the street, how it once housed thousands of books and how the doors were once blue. He showed Connor the home of the old man that had once made candy out of maple syrup for the kids, the barber shop where he had gotten his hair cut, and the general store where he and his friends had bought trading cards and model airplanes. He lead Connor past the old schoolhouse, the square where they held public assemblies and festivals, and the street that had housed the farmer’s market, lined with abandoned stands that had been depleted of their signs by the ever-blowing gale. At some point, Oliver had taken his hand to drag him along the streets his friends had lived in, and Connor found him more substantial than anything in the barren borough.

“This was my second cousin’s restaurant,” Oliver informed as they passed under a half-fallen sign. The half that was still up read “Amy’s.”

There was a set of chairs and a dusty table in front of one of the boarded-up windows. Connor’s stomach grumbled as they sat down to rest.

“Sorry,” he said. “I didn’t get to eat lunch.”

“I’m sorry too,” Oliver said in his nectarine voice. “If you’d come here years ago, Amy would have been able to stuff you with her famous mashed potatoes until you were so full you couldn’t eat anything more. But then you would have to make room for the pie. Amy’s known for her pies, and she’s proud of them. She would never let anyone off the hook.”

Oliver had that nostalgic look on his face as he reminisced that was part wistful, part happy, that made Connor what to both rush forward to smooth it out and sit and study the planes of Oliver’s face for hours.

“I’m sorry,” Connor said again.

Oliver raised a side of his lips in a half-smile for him. “What for?”

“That your childhood home is gone, just like that.”

Oliver reached over and took one of Connor’s hand in his. His eyes, his words, his entire figure was full of earnestness as he spoke to Connor. “You don’t have to apologize for that. It’s just the course of life. Towns rise and fall, and civilizations too. It’s our fortune to be able to live --- to see it happen.”

Connor contemplated it, returning Oliver’s gaze intently. Without preamble, he surged forward and captured Oliver’s lips in his.

Oliver was cool and his mouth was slick, a relief from the dusty, hot mess of the town. Connor melted into him, molding their lips and hands together, fingers brushing over knuckles, noses bumping. Oliver made a noise into the kiss, something between a whimper and a moan, and Connor was pulling him out of his seat and into Connor’s lap.

He felt Oliver’s thighs quiver as their tongues danced and Connor pulled back to bite at Oliver’s Adam’s apple. Oliver’s moan was free to come out unobstructed then, loud and resonant in the hushed street. Connor attacked the sliver of skin at the base of Oliver’s neck offered by his shirt with vigor, pressing bruises into the pale skin with his lips. Oliver took his hands out of their grip on Connor’s and carded them through Connor’s hair, tugging at the roots when Connor found a particularly sensitive spot.

A loud _clang_ rang out across the silent street, the sound of something metal hitting a lamppost. Connor started, staring out to find the source of disturbance, and when he turned back, Oliver had already slipped from his lap and gone.

“Asher,” Connor cursed, lowly and murderously, as a loud shout followed the noise. He was going to give the fool something scarier than ghosts to fear.

  


“I have to confess,” Laurel said as she took took the bag of chips Wes offered her. “This isn’t as much of a disaster as I thought it would be.”

“This isn’t so bad.” Michaela’s face was lit up by the brilliance of the orange and red flames of their campfire. “Who knew this ghost town is actually _less_ scary at night?”

“I told you the song would work,” Asher said.

“Hitting a lamppost with a metal baseball bat isn’t a song, it’s an annoyance,” Wes retorted. “Why did you think doing performing some ritual the Internet told you would actually work?”

“Excuse me, but do you see any ghosts here?” Ashere spread his arms out and looked from left to right. “No? Then you’re welcome.”

“You did nothing.” Michaela voiced their common sentiment.

“Connor, you’re unusually quiet,” Laurel remarked. “You haven’t even contributed anything snarky to the conversation yet.”

Connor jabbed at the contents of his paper plate dispassionately. He hadn’t told them about Oliver, sure that they wouldn’t believe him. And now that Oliver had disappeared to who-knows-where, Connor would probably never see him again.

He sighed, the sound coming out louder than he expected in the lull in the conversation as all eyes turned towards him.

“It’s nothing,” he dismissed. “I’m just tired and dusty. How are we going to sleep tonight? I don’t think I can take eight hours cramped in that car.”

“We have our sleeping bags in the trunk, and it’s warm enough that we can sleep outside,” Laurel said.

“No biggie.” Asher stood up and stretch his arms far above his head. “I’m down for that, since it’s safe enough to sleep outside now, thanks to me.”

He was met by four unimpressed glares.

Connor didn’t expect to fall asleep so easily on the hard and dirty ground, but he was out like a light as soon as they had all settled down in a ring of sleeping bags. When he woke up, he was sure it was because of the wind in his ears.

“Connor,” came Oliver’s voice instead.

The moon shone especially bright that night, so Oliver seemed paler than he was during the day. At night, however, he no longer had that gray tinge from the day and instead seemed to glow from reflected brightness. He was ethereal.

“You’re still here?” Connor uttered as soon as he had gathered enough of his wits to speak.

“Of course. It’s not like I would ever leave.” Oliver was grinning again, and he was so beautiful Connor was distracted from the oddness of his statement for a long while.

“Why not? There isn’t anything here.”

The boy’s expression dropped so fast Connor didn’t recognize Oliver for a second --- didn’t recognize the frown that folded across his mouth nor the almost-malice in Oliver’s normally bright eyes. As he looked on, Connor realized he couldn’t decide what color they were. He had initially thought Oliver’s eyes were brown, under the sun at noon, and then he’d seen hints of green at Amy’s. When Connor had first woken up to Oliver’s face, gleaming angelic in the moonlight, he’d thought they were blue. They were more akin to gray now, so dark they were almost black.

“This is my home,” Oliver said, and his voice was sharper than the broken glass of the old windows on which Connor had to be careful not to cut himself.

A hundred replies flitted through Connor’s head, and he knew if he answered wrong he would lose Oliver forever. “You can’t live here,” he finally said, weakly.

It was the wrong decision. Oliver’s face shut down in anger, leaving Connor with only the impression of an angry mask as he faded into the dark town.

Connor didn’t chase after him, but sleep refused to come to him again.

  


When Connor woke up, his mouth was dry like the previous morning. The sun was as unbearable as it had been yesterday as well, yet Connor couldn’t find it in himself to throw off his sleeping bag and get up for the day. His entire body felt tired and energyless, weighed down by something he couldn’t shake off.

Michaela mentioned his bloodshot eyes and untidy hair as they packed their stuff in Laurel’s car. Connor told her about the few minutes of sleep he got and brushed off her concern. He could sleep in the car once they leave.

He wasn’t ready to leave. Not with things left unfinished.

Connor held a stack of sandwiches in his hand as he wandered through the streets, re-visiting all of the places he and Oliver had visited the day before. He stomached half of one as he searched, but the rest could wait until he found Oliver. Idly, he wondered if the other man was hungry, if he had eaten breakfast and dinner the night before. He wasn’t sure where the man lived --- he hadn’t seen a car with him the day before and none of the buildings were stable enough to go in ---

Except, of course, the library.

Connor almost hit himself on the head for his foolishness. He had seen Oliver come out of the library yesterday, of course it was the only place Oliver could be staying. He shook off speculations of how the man was living in the abandoned town, alone in an old library and broke into a run.

The once-blue doors were firmly shut today, but Connor was too determined to be deterred. He knocked on the doors, boldly, and hoped Oliver would give him at least the chance to see him one last time before he left.

Connor waited outside for a full minute, sweating from the heat and nervousness, before Oliver answered. He was pale and lovely as always, none of the last night’s anger marring his perfect features.

“Can I help you?” He wasn’t smiling, but Connor was ecstatic that he was at least speaking to him.

“These are for you.” He removed the half-eaten sandwich from the stack and offered the rest to Oliver.

Oliver looked at the sandwiches and then at Connor. He seemed to be scrutinizing his face, and Connor tried to convey his sincerity and earnestness.

“Connor,” Oliver finally said. The syllables of Connor’s name crunched through his mouth and rolled off his tongue with more grace than the sweetest of songs. “Thank you, but I don’t eat.”

Connor bit his bottom lip. “I wanted to … “ The words stayed lodged in his throat. He’d spoken dozens of times, in front of hundreds of people, and he could convince them of anything he said, but speaking to Oliver about this was a thousand times harder.

“To apologize?” Oliver finished for him.

Connor nodded wordlessly.

Oliver exhaled laboriously, and in a tone full of self-loathing, he said, “You are lucky you’re cute.”

Connor could barely raise his eyebrows before a pair of lips came crashing into his, the sandwiches tumbling, forgotten, onto the dusty ground.

**Author's Note:**

> Look forward to a part two of this story told in Oliver's POV. Connor's perception of the things happening in the ghost town are limited, and Oliver lies.


End file.
